2025 Plans What is Working, What Needs Work?

As you near the end of the planner year, it's the right time to reflect on two questions:

What is working for me now?

What needs work in the coming year?

Take a moment to reflect on the skills you worked on over the year. Executive functioning skills included exercises on: list making (to-do and done lists), chunking information, habit bundling, anticipating anxiety, planning out a year, color coding, self-care, prioritization, structuring your day.  Think back on the skills, exercises, and organization in the planner that worked for you – maybe there’s a trick you picked up on that worked really well for your brain, your life, your household. 

It’s amazing what our brains can do, and frankly, how silly and easily tricked our brains can be, too. Human brains are tricked into certain chain-reaction experiences - a jump scare in a movie will cause you to actually jump and cover your eyes. Watching other people cry in a touching movie can cause you to cry with them, even though we know it's just a movie. We can use these tricks to create excitement (or dread) about tasks we want to master. 

Here’s a brief exercise:

1. Imagine a task you want to accomplish that fills you with some amount of resistance, hesitation, or even a mental block. Some examples might be: cleaning your car, folding multiple loads of laundry, or organizing your closet so that it becomes functional again. Examine your current feelings and emotions about this task: see your own resistance, feel the absence of movement, be aware of your dislike for the task. 
2. Now, you are going to build a different set of feelings and thoughts:

• I can do this for 15 minutes and will notice a positive difference.
• This is a task that is totally do-able, I can get this done quickly.
• When I do this task, I will feel so much better.
• Getting this task done is going to create positive changes in my day to day life.

• 3. The focus has moved from the feeling you have before the task to the feelings you have after the task ("wow, it's easier now that this task is completed"). Use the feelings at the outcome to your advantage. Magnify those emotions by really feeling the positivity that comes from getting it done.
• 4. Now set a timer for 15 minutes and go do a task that usually comes with dread and repeat a positive outcome mantra to yourself whenever you start to become emotionally discouraged. Keep the focus on your ability to do this task for 15 minutes, and the ways it will improve your living environment.